In these days, research and development are being vigorously made on various display devices. Especially, organic electroluminescent (EL) devices have been noted as promising display devices since they can emit light with a high luminance at a low voltage. Conventional condensed-ring aromatic compounds used in EL devices are chemically stable but low in the lowest triplet excitation energy level (T1). It is therefore desired that organic electroluminescence devices using triplet luminescence be further improved.
As described above, condensed-ring aromatic compounds are generally low in the T1 energy level; therefore, the compounds are disadvantageous in efficiency for transferring energy to dopants. To improve the luminous efficiency, it has been desired to develop aromatic hydrocarbon materials having a higher T1 energy level. For example, JP-A-2001-167884 (“JP-A” means unexamined published Japanese patent application) discloses an organic electroluminescence device using tetraphenylene, but the device lacks satisfactory luminous efficiency.